Kenilworth rugby club has staged a historic inaugural meeting of a newly created body aimed at helping Pacific Island rugby players cope with life in Europe.

The Pacific Rugby Players Welfare (PRPW) board aims to assist the ever-growing number of Tongans, Samoans and Fijians who now earn their living in France, England, Ireland and Wales with everything from the mundanities of life to more serious issues of player welfare.

Over 80 players of Pacific Islands heritage now ply their trade in the Aviva Premiership, as part of a wider 600-strong community across Europe.

They have brought power, pace, skill and flair to the European game, and in many cases have gone on to settle here, and even represent their new homelands at international level.

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Bath and Wales No.8 Taulupe Faletau is about to make his second Lions tour, while the likes of Leicester’s Manu Tuilagi, Faletau’s club colleague Semesa Rokoduguni and Wasps’ Nathan Hughes have all represented England in the recent past.

However, as Hughes remembers, adjusting to life in Europe is far from straightforward for newly-arrived islanders whose culture is very different.

“My first year in England was tough,” he says. “I was born in Fiji but although I’d lived in New Zealand for several years it was still hard settling here.

Jacob Umaga of Wasps during the Anglo-Welsh Cup match against Exeter Chiefs

“Hopefully this organisation can achieve a lot, but I’m sure we can definitely help players cope better with that sort of adjustment.”

Many will remember the confusion which surrounded Tuilagi’s right to live in the UK a few years ago, while Kenilworth-based Mike Umaga, who along with his Wasps academy son Jacob was part of the inaugural meeting, also went through a tough period following his removal as Coventry’s head coach by the club’s then-owner Andrew Green.

Tuilagi joined his star Leicester Tigers brothers in the East Midlands in 2003, arriving as a 13-year-old on a holiday visa that was never amended.

Six years later, the by then Premiership and England star narrowly avoided deportation thanks to a strenuous campaign from his club and the RFU.

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“I really didn’t know anything about it at the time. Growing up in Samoa we would never have had to deal with paperwork like that.

“Here you’ve got to work and earn your living. Back in Samoa you can live off the land, you don’t pay tax, you own your own house and land.

“It was a big culture shock coming to England, coping with the lifestyle changes, the little things day by day.”

While administrative matters and culture shock presented by life in Europe may seem trivial, the ability to turn to the PRPW may also prevent situations escalating into something much more serious.

The founding fathers of PRPW pose for a picture at Kenilworth RFC

For instance, the rugby world was horrified in the autumn to discover that Isireli Temo, a 30-year-old Fijian prop playing for Tarbes in the French third division took his own life after struggling to cope with the rigours of life as an injured professional rugby player.

So the organisation now led by former Samoa, Wasps and London Irish lock Dan Leo has an important role to play, alongside a 14-strong players board which includes Tuilagi and his Leicester colleague Matt Toomua, and deserves the support of all rugby followers.